steamrolling through u.s. consumer data as only the occupy movement can protesters are buying up debt for pennies on the dollar and then for giving it some call it in ingenious idea others a disaster waiting to happen we'll debate the effectiveness of this program straight ahead. plus sacks of lies and the surveillance state the more the patriot scandal unfolds the more curious the case becomes but the other made for t.v. sex drama we'll tell you why this story matters for your internet privacy and what it says about the state of surveillance in the u.s. .

as a lens are you november fourteenth five pm here in washington d.c. i'm liz wall here watching r t. a how do you feel about bailing out the people instead of the big banks that's what a spinoff of the occupy wall street is on a mission to do that's called the rolling jubilee and catching the attention of journalists and the finance sector it's being built hailed and scrutinized here's the organization's explanation of it. we shouldn't be forced into debt to cover basic needs like health care housing and education we need a jubilee a clean slate cancellation of ninety nine percent here's how we're going to do it in america banks on this shadowy market full of death buyers that collectors then turn around and try to extort the full amount from us that's where the rolling

jubilee comes in and it raises money. but instead of collecting on the debts we were going to abolish. who. should say. wow. the mouth is on our side a little bit of money goes a long way if we can raise fifty thousand dollars we can buy a million dollars worth of abolishing if we raise more we can abolish even more. so as you just heard the idea behind the jubilee is to buy distressed debt for pennies on the dollar and then forgive it they're filling the role normally played by debt collectors except now it's a group of ordinary citizens buying and selling the bad debt and bailing out the people rather than forcing them to pay more for someone drowning in debt a position millions of americans are and this sounds like a miracle but is it all too good to be true joining me now is rachel courage in our d.c. studio and new york in new york r.t.

correspondent honest churkin i welcome ladies to the both of you see i'm going to start with you this is jubilee as it's call it's getting a lot of attention a lot of positive feedback but there are some six skeptics what are some of the concerns people have with this rolling jubilee idea well it's absolutely as we know as a network that has covered the occupy wall street movement since its inception and one thing it has never locked is haters and critics and this rolling jubilee the strike exacts project is certainly no exception it's and you know the criticism is really ranging from things like oh we think this is a really good idea but occupy wall street is still wrong and it's really a terrible movement two things that are a little more legitimate some social moral as well as legal concerns and one of the kind of top concerns that is circulating out there is the fact that some people some critics are seeing this really as something that's just a band-aid on something that needs a much stronger solution they're seeing it as really

a drop in the bucket and because the problem is so enormous as we know of course the overall american consumer debt in this is that over eleven trillion dollars the student debt bubble is over one trillion dollars over seventy seven percent of american households are being hounded by debt collectors so considering this and the fact that occupy wall street with this project has so far raised over one hundred seventy thousand dollars which should be able to abolish over three million dollars these numbers do not nearly out up because so much more needs to be done and earlier we caught up with economist max wolfe who broke it down for us he compared it to trying to cure homelessness take a listen to how he explains it. you go home and you get all your friends together and you make a giant you know giant pot of macaroni and you drive around and you give a whole bunch of people who you hope you haven't insulted because of their personal style but who actually are homeless you walk up to them and you give them of spoon

and a bag of macaroni is that a good thing to do sure will feed those people yes will they be happy yes does it and almost this poor. and another concern we're hearing is that this action is really even the occupy wall street tries to fight wall street and big banks is really not that anti bank because if we keep in mind the fact that banks with this project will still be making five cents on the dollar instead of getting nothing with some of the distressed debt that exists out there this kind of creates a system where the banks are still getting the money even though people are being helped with the abolish debt max wolf also broke that down for us take a listen if you buy debts of people who were in a hopeless situation and have virtually no chance of repairing their what you're actually doing is transferring money from your liberal donors to the banks that own that money all that that would otherwise not be paid at all. well definitely quite a few concerns rotating out there but others who support this idea say it's better to do something then do nothing at all so we'll have to wait and see exactly how

much money the occupy wall street movement is going to get be able to collect through this project certainly we are seeing people that are trying to find the cracks in this and this plan another thing that critics are saying is that what this will inevitably lead to is an increase in taxes that there's going to be consequences to this and i want to pull up there's this quote it's from business week it states quote a person can truly disappear with no consequences the amount forgiven is technically income cancellation of debt income it's an internal revenue service terms so rachel i want to ask you are tax is inevitably the result of forgiving debt that is bought on pennies to the dollar well i think the it is a very good question to wonder exactly how is the iris going to view the debt forgiveness that this rolling jubilee is offering and people have come up with different ideas as to how accountants kayin sensually look at look at this

forgiveness and what people have said is if the accountants are actually viewing this as a gift then that is i.r.s. exempt and people actually won't be taxed on that certainly it depends on who your accountant is and we've seen in the past that depending on who your accountant is you might actually pay a different amount of taxes but there is a way that this could be i.r.s. exempt and people wouldn't be taxed on it even if they were taxed on it however they would still be saving money in the long term as opposed to be paying you know all this interest in addition to the debt that they would already be paying get a good account and i guess is the lesson there if you don't want to pay the taxes and have a good accountant but. you're saying ok maybe these people are not going to have to pay taxes themselves as a consequence of this but. when a debt is written off it's not like it just mysteriously disappears somebody is. the price for it sure yeah it's going to be the person that is expecting their money back yes but at this point no one is really expecting their money back so essentially that question goes back to the idea of who's going to be losing money

if this debt is distressed which it already is so essentially the bank loses money when people don't pay back their loans is that the borrowers fault is that the bank's fault for not more thoroughly veteran that they're going to be issuing loans to that question is up for debate but the bottom line is by the time the debt distress debt is actually being sold to the loan collectors it's already expected that investors aren't going to get their money back so if we agree it this point at this point that there are the at you might is when debt collectors get this money they're getting the most part three percent of the people they're hounding they're actually going to get money back from so what this ruling do you believe is saying is you know we're going to be giving the investors whatever these debts are actually worth at this point which is five cents on the dollar because there is such a slim chance of them being repaid but then instead of trying to hound people for it individuals yourself me whoever decides oh i want to donate to rowing do you

believe knows that this money is going towards forgiving the debt. interesting on the south i want to ask you because the ultimate goal here is to help people that are struggling and drowning and dad another argument is why is it more worthy to help those that are indebted and decided you know they're the ones that decide to take on this debt whether it be a home loan or student debt or credit card debt. they took on this debt as opposed to those that are just poor. that's kind of another argument that i brought out there when you think about that well listen it's definitely one of the concerns out there but it's really curious why it has to be an either or because obviously a family that's indebted in a family that's poor both of these are struggling and both of these need help it's just a matter of in this particular case the occupy wall. movement decided to deal with debt so it doesn't mean that more action will follow in terms of saving poor families however they can but to follow up on the point you ladies were making

earlier about the taxes i think it's important to mention that it's also the curiosity of the system works in a way that even though this distressed debt is being bought for pennies on the dollar when it comes to taxes it's a dollar per dollar transaction so if some of these people will end up having to pay taxes it's certainly going to be quite a considerable number of that's why it's one of the concerns and in terms of you know these these abolishing the debt is being seen as gifts we have to remember that there's also an exclusion if somebody is giving you money that's more than twelve thousand dollars and they're not a family member that could still apply under the i.r.s. under the tax code as a tax that needs to be paid so it's a very common convoluted system there so it's going to really depend on a case by case basis how that works out when it comes to two people getting their debt abolished and this system this whole scheme it makes occupiers part of this this market system that they've kind of been criticizing. and you know that they

are the system that has bailed out the big banks rather than the people and that's i guess that's that is a big difference there but they are using this very market that they protested against it when they in the way. it is a kind hypocritical that they're kind of using these tactics and spinning it to their own advantage. i don't think that's really the case i mean i don't think they are spinning this to their own advantage because certainly unlike buyers out there in the secondary market making trying to make a profit all of this distrust that is certainly something the occupy wall street movement is not doing they're not making any profit off of this and that's exactly why it's seen as something completely different from the way corporations interact on the market with distressed debt so this this idea that they're chasing right now with this abolishing debt is basically yes it works in the way the market runs but it's certainly very much different in the sense that nobody's trying to make a profit and they're really doing this out of goodwill to help as many people as they can instead of trying to fool as many people as they can and drag them into

these insane debt burdens interesting. seems like there are no profit so they're doing it out of the goodness of their hearts. so it's clear right now that the u.s. households carry way too much debt as an aside on the saucy i mentioned earlier over a trillion dollars in student loans and trillions and trillions in total loans. and getting rid of their debt obviously it will help the families that no longer have this debt will that in turn help the economy on a larger scale i think that's a really good question and i think what it comes down to is exactly how you're viewing this debt in the context of society in the context of the economy what we've seen is that people who are under debt it's not just that they owe money so they're not going to save by a doormat for a new house or something the other thing is that it's become a public health issue people who are in debt people who are constantly being hounded by credit collectors have higher you know blood pressure they're higher instances of heart problems things of that nature so what we see is that if you're

helping someone deal with an economic issue even if it's on an individual level you're going to lessen a societal burden that's essential people are in so much trouble based on their debt that not only are they not going to go out and spend but they're not going to be as productive say at work as they might be if you're. seeing that all day they're getting hounded by debt collectors so you know i can't i don't think that. rolling to billy's actually going to change the idea in our economy that you can get things based on debt you know people are still going to buy things on layaway i think that people are still going to buy mortgages and i don't think that that's necessarily a bad thing as long as when they're taking out these new loans there you know the contracts are fair and there's a reasonable understanding that they'll actually get that money back and i think that that's what our economy is shifting towards anyway just because credit is already so constricted that if we're going to help those people on an individual basis i think that that might help the economy and even if it doesn't i think that it's worthwhile enough to be helping these individuals. this jubilee definitely has

a great ring to it but you know the total debt in this country we're talking trillions of dollars so this by no means is a cure all no absolutely liz but you know the beauty of this project is nobody is really expecting it to be a cure all for the economy it's really just another step that the occupy wall street movement that's been criticized so intensely for not coming up with specific action is exactly what it's now doing it has this plan in place a lot of the economists regardless of the critics are saying it's one of the best ideas they've ever had and it's certainly they can help even a small percentage of americans who need the help what's wrong with that it sounds like a perfect plan all right lastly i do want to ask you because you were that's listening saying you know what i'm a dad i want to get my dad. how do they get in on this. well the trick here is that they can't because the way occupy wall street is distributing this money it's a secret so you can't really you know if you're a member of the occupy wall street movement you can't have your friend come to you

and say hey can you make sure that you know you guys abolish my debt that's not the way it works it's going to be very randomly selected and they're going to buy this distressed randomly so that unfortunately what people can do is when they do get a call if they do get a call saying it's their debt that was abolished they will be asked to throw in a couple of bucks and that's what makes it a rolling to believe is that if you've been helped out throw in some money and hopefully that money will end up helping someone else interesting spread that goodwill and appreciate both of you know weighing in on this that was our t. producer rachel currency has sent our t. correspondent. well speaking of debt the holidays are just around the corner now and that means retailers and shoppers are gearing up for the biggest shopping day of the year that of course is a black friday but the california employees at the nation's largest retailer are also getting ready to go on strike on the big day wal-mart workers plan to walk out on black friday in protest of what they call poor working conditions and low wages

many are also upset they're working all day on thanksgiving to prepare for the following day well this could pose a major problem for wal-mart which enjoys it more than a quarter of its annual sales on black friday but this would be the first time wal-mart workers walked out we've reported on strikes that have happened in recent months and since then some workers say the company has retaliated by reducing hours even firing some people. now some employees are firing back again we'll keep you updated on how this all plays out. in our tease so general petraeus has a mistress why should you care well that speaks volumes about internet privacy we'll tell you about how this sex scandal is triggering a serious debate about u.s. surveillance.

here's mitt romney trying to figure out the name of that thing that the american. i don't know. i'm sorry i'm going to die here is an awful lot of. uses are are. out of my sails right now i want the usa to defeat terrorism a liberal and a chris. consecutively to the. telescope are going to distract us from what you and i should care about because they're profit driven

industry that sells us sensationalistic garbage he calls it breaking news i'm not me martin and we're going to break that. decline of american power continues. things in our country

so bad that might actually be time for a revolution. and it turns out that a popular drink of starbucks has a surprising in radio. welcome to the capital account i'm laurin let's for. all the media fascinated with the twists and turns in the poetry a sex scandal but instead of obsessing over the general's personal sex life should

people be more concerned about how this all became public and we know about the affair thanks to an f.b.i. investigation which agents sifted through thousands of e-mails between betray us and his mistress paula broadwell but broadwell is certainly not alone google's semiannual transparency report shows that the number of government requests for user information has skyrocketed take a look in the first six months of two thousand and twelve google says it's received more than twenty thousand requests nearly eight thousand of them were from the u.s. and ninety percent of them were filled. well now that the petraeus story has exploded it is the real story of the government's ease and desire to snoop on people's online activity even when there is no crime being committed to discuss he mancini gum founder of ask as s p blue joins us now hi you know so what do you think is the media missing the big story here hi liz thanks for

having me well i think what you're seeing in action is the balance of users and citizens right to privacy with the right of the government to investigate and online crime and that ultimately is what you're seeing playing out unfortunately it's playing out on national television with general petraeus in the in the issues that have come across his way but that from a citizen at home perspective is this is what's actually happening do you think it took a big scandal like this from from one of our top military leaders in order for people to really realize the extent to which surveillance goes on. sometimes it does take something very politically connected to get mainstream attention no doubt this has done that but overall what what i think citizens are perhaps surprised about is the fact that the f.b.i. can do these things but ultimately if you step back and look at it the government has been conducting investigations like they always do they chase after the footprints they chase after the evidence that somebody may have been left behind

whether that's in the physical world or it's in the online world and in this case what you are seeing is the e-mails that were coming from from ms broadwell going to our victim in this story as people have been talking about it were coming from an internet related e-mail account and therefore the f.b.i. as part of their normal course of investigating any crime are looking and saying where is that e-mail coming from who owns that e-mail who might be behind it where they're located and one piece after another goes into a file and then it's examined to figure out who's doing this and a report that. google released in a quest to be transparent kind of the numbers there really illustrate how common it is we see google's transparency report the u.s. is leading in the number of requests one to pull this graph up here we see that government requests have increased exponentially over the years and since two

thousand and four the demand to snoop on e-mails and other internet activity you see rises dramatically so what do you think about that that the u.s. is really on the forefront of this compared to other countries especially when we really tell that we we have free speech here. well i think there's no question that in america we do have free speech which is a great thing i was actually inside of microsoft back in two thousand and four working on criminal investigations with law enforcement and doing exactly what google is doing in this situation which is complying with the legal request i think what you're seeing is when you have an internet connected society which the united states is then much like the physical world a lot of the crime has moved into the online environment and what the government has started doing is focusing more on the online connections to physical world crimes and even even if you step back and look at what's happening in the criminal

society you're seeing organized crime getting involved you're seeing identity theft going from the physical side to the online site you're seeing fraud and occurring and because the u.s. government has been working closely with the private sector such as google and microsoft yahoo all the major internet companies of the world as well as of the united states you will see more investigations taking place online so i'm not surprised by the numbers they actually make a lot of sense and i think if you look at the numbers around the world over the past ten years and going forward in the next five or ten years the more connected a society becomes the more broadband penetration faster internet access the more others in the criminal element will start using it right out of an absolutely does make sense the more that people conduct their lives online which is what we're seeing the more that. every all facets they are going to. spread on the internet and use crimes that are. you know exactly why they can be

counted on and on the internet so as we're seeing but because of this. he who do you think that it's easier now for the government to be able to spy and obtain information since it all is stored in cyberspace where you know what's really interesting about this is and i think in society most people are not aware of this there's a thing and the technical fancy legal word is the electronic communications privacy act what we often call in our industry and there is laws that govern what the government's ability to get to know who somebody is where they are and what they're doing online and when google receives a request from microsoft a.o.l. yahoo and the internet company out there that request needs to comply with the legal requirements of the electronic communications privacy that the f.b.i. has been very well trained by the justice department prosecutors and i was one of those prosecutors on exactly how to make those requests the private sector has

systems in place to balance the users' privacy on their on their own networks and sites with the government's right to investigate what you're going to actually see is theirs and on top of that there's a judicial system that's built around it that says wait before you can get the contents of somebodies e-mail you need to get a search warrant for example which means the judicial system magistrate will have to sign off on it and say that's ok you did what you were supposed to in conducting this investigation you did it properly and then the system inside a company like google will do something similar and say well let me just double check that before i disclose it because after all i do care about the privacy of our users and let's make sure that happened and i think in that report that you were showing the graphic of that's exactly when google says that they have disclosed on ninety percent of the situations what that means is there were some incidents there where there was a checks and balance in progress that was working balancing the right to privacy with the right to investigate but we are seeing that

a lot of these searches are conducted without a search warrant. well i think it's easy to use the word search and i think a lot of people do they say the search was conducted but i don't without a warrant you know when we think of searches that can happen in a situation where there's a warrant and the government goes and gets a warrant there could also be a reason why there is for example an emergency where a government needs to go into something because there's impending death or impending bodily harm that's that and i know i'm being redundant but that could happen which in a sense means it's impending it's urgent the government has to obtain information and that information may help stop a crime or stop something horrible from happening and so there incidences that you will find where there was no warrant but a search was still actually under the law and counts for this was allowed no is it a search to say who is somebody and subscriber information and that's a subpoena is required for that there are certain e-mails that have been sitting around there are no longer considered private by the law and that's where

a court order may be allowed so there's different levels of legal process but at the end of the day what it's doing is it's balancing the two rights we talked about and doing it under a judicial system that when you walk into court and you haven't done it right the first thing that's going to happen they'll be a motion to prevent the introduction of that evidence and so if you're the f.b.i. and you're going to get your person you have to follow the law really interesting him and we are at a time it's interesting that takes a big sex scandal. of our peoples. to make it public and that extent to which this really does happen isn't so much for coming on the show that was he mancini founder of an ass as people thanks to. now to a drone story about drones in pakistan except this time there is a twist the arm drones along the pakistan at least in the future a senior pakistani to bunch of defense officials said the country is working to

develop its very own combat ready drones complete with weapons this was revealed at a pakistani arms fair pakistan has already manufactured its own surveillance drone the country uses these drones to watch groups like the taliban but these surveillance drones would need to be significantly retooled in order to carry weapons the pakistani government has been a vocal opponent of the united states using armed drones to conduct targeted strikes and its borders according to the bureau of investigative journalism between two thousand five hundred and three thousand three hundred people were killed by drone strikes in pakistan in june of two thousand and four one question is what exactly the drones will look like in pakistan the buses there are distinctive looking and ornately decorated so makes you wonder if that all a transfer over but there are other questions about how pakistan is getting its own combat drone and how would affect the region's power dynamic for instance would pakistan use these drones.